


moments where the words don't reach

by princessoftheworlds



Series: It's not a crime to love what you cannot explain [25]
Category: The Originals (TV), The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-30
Updated: 2018-08-30
Packaged: 2019-07-04 18:27:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15846894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/princessoftheworlds/pseuds/princessoftheworlds
Summary: The five times Caroline and Klaus received the ending they deserved and the one time they didn't.





	moments where the words don't reach

**i.**

Klaus swirls his glass of bourbon in his hand, the amber-colored liquid nearly sloshing over the edge, and sniffs it suspiciously. The Mystic Grill might be an established institution for many things in this godforsaken town of Mystic Falls, but good liquor is not one of them. He’s found a better selection of alcohol at the Salvatore Boarding House, where the supply’s controlled by the sorry excuse of a vampire known as Damon Salvatore.

The sharp clicking of heeled boots across creaky wooden boards carries over to Klaus’s ears above the meaningless chatter of common humans also in the Grill, and he twists around from his perch on the bar stool expecting to berate Rebekah for abandoning her role as the doppelganger’s warden, only for his eyes to land on a different blonde instead. One who, as it turns out, has occupied his thoughts for several days.

“Ooh. I remember her from last night.” Kol has also turned around, his drink forgotten on the bar counter behind him as he points gleefully at Caroline. She, after casting a quick searching glance around the restaurant, then proceeds towards the bar. “She looks like a tasty little thing,” he adds.

Anger flares up in Klaus, and he growls at his brother, “Say another word, and I’ll tear out your liver.” Before Kol can snap back a cleverly-worded reply, Caroline nearly slips past them, and Klaus calls her name.

She grinds to a halt in front of them, eyes flickering between both Originals. “Oh, it’s you,” she states plainly, her tone exasperated. She crosses her arms across her chest, not-so-subtly pushing her delectable cleavage up.

Kol raises his nearly-empty glass up to acknowledge her, but they both ignore him.

Klaus ducks his head, and his gaze falls on his own glass, still clutched tightly in his hand. “Join us for a drink?” he asks, flashing her a slight smile.

Caroline tilts her head and shoots them an assessing glance. She hums, almost like she’s considering his offer, but then smiles devastatingly. “I’d rather die of thirst,” she tells him, words sticky with saccharine, “but thanks.”

As she leaves, Klaus’s smile morphs into a boyish but genuine grin. “Isn’t she stunning?” he asks Kol, radiating with an emotion akin to pride.

His brother smirks at him. “She certainly looks good walking away from you,” Kol quips.

Klaus rolls his eyes, reaching inside his jacket pocket and tossing a thick wad of bills to pay for his drink. “I’ll take that as a challenge,” he says with a nod of his head and then heads towards the door, moving at a reasonable pace to avoid alarming the simple-minded humans.

Outside, Caroline has just crossed the road, and he hurries after her, narrowly avoiding a car. “Caroline!” 

She swirls around, fixing him with a cross look. “Are you serious?” she asks. “Take a hint!” Huffing as she tosses her curls over her shoulder, she continues across the town square.

“Don’t be angry, love,” Klaus says as he follows. “We had a little spat.” He shrugs. “I’m over it already.”

“Ah,” she says, voice higher-pitched than normal. “Well, I’m not.”

“How can I acquit myself?” he asks, laughter tinging his words and voice carrying across the empty plaza.

This stops Caroline in her tracks, and she faces him again. “You--” she says accusingly, “you and your expensive jewelry and your romantic drawings can  _ leave me alone _ !” Her voice raises in volume as she finishes speaking.

Klaus’s expression softens, and he briefly glances over his shoulder back at the Grill. 

“Oh, come on,” he says, lilting accent wrapping around his next words. “Take a chance, Caroline.” He pauses, and she scoffs, turning her nose up at him. “Talk to me,” he tells her, taking a seat on the bench behind him. When she still lingers, standing, he insists, “Come on, get to know me.” Caroline continues to hesitate, staring down at the bench and him, and he tilts his head invitingly. “I dare you,” he says in a challenge he knows that she will be unable to resist.

As usual, he is right, and Caroline shakes her head in disbelief, “Fine.” She sits down beside him, sighing. Then she turns towards him and bobs her head awkwardly for a few moments before diving straight to it. “So, what do you wanna talk about?”

“I want to talk about you--” he states plainly, and she huffs, shaking her head again, but he forges on, “your hopes, your dreams, everything you want in life.”

Caroline laughs lightly, but not entirely kindly, tipping her head back. She faces him, amusement still in her voice. “Just to be clear,” she tells him, looking angelic with her rosy cheeks and bright eyes and golden curls hanging loosely. “I’m too smart to be seduced by you.”

Klaus smiles, “Well, that’s why I like you.”

She gapes at him, eyes glittering with unreadable emotion, and in that moment, the mood changes, a spark igniting between them. Caroline leans forward unconsciously, hands hovering in her lap as her head tilts just the slightest bit.

Reading the moment, Klaus inches forward, gentle hand reaching to slide up against Caroline’s chin and cup her cheek. With exaggerated movements, he angles his head and brushes his lips against hers with the lightest pressure before straightening up.

Caroline is reduced to wordlessness, and her cheeks would be flushing if her vampire body wasn’t incapable of producing that oh-so-human reaction. She finally musters the strength to say something, her voice hoarse and unnecessarily breathless, “What was that for?”

Klaus fixes her with a knowing look. 

“I believe you already know the answer to your own question.” He pauses dramatically before echoing his previous words to her. “ _ Thank you for your honesty. _ ”

 

**ii.**

Caroline’s admiring Klaus’s painting (for an evil immortal hybrid, the man is unfairly talented… and unfairly hot) when the hairs on the back of her neck begin to prickle, and she becomes aware that she’s being watched. She whirls around faster than the human eye can track, aided by her vampire speed. Klaus is smiling fondly at her, suave in his suit with the top few buttons undone, and she quips, “Here to steal Tiny Tim’s crutches?”

The bastard has the gall to laugh, his chuckle smooth and rich in her ear. “Dickens was a dark man,” he says, coming towards her. “You would have liked him.” 

He starts to round the table, but Caroline continues around to the other side, opposing him.

“Nice snowflake, by the way,” she says sarcastically, jerking her head towards the painting.

Klaus glances back at it , his eyebrows furrowing together, “Is my work really that literal?” he sighs.

She huffs a laugh, gaze flickering back to the painting. “I’m serious. There’s something…” she studies it, the light-colored snowflake covered in harsh, black slashes of paint, “…lonely about it.” Her voice is soft as she smiles at Klaus’s art.

He stares at her with analytical eyes, and so much passes between them: unsaid but understood. 

“I’m gonna take that as a compliment,” he says then pauses. A beat passes before he asks, “Can I offer you some champagne?

She wants to accept his offer,  _ she so does _ , but she has a feeling that saying yes would be expressing her agreement to more than just champagne. So, instead, she turns on her heel and begins to move away, ducking her head and tossing her phone between her hands awkwardly. 

“Can’t, too many adult prying eyes.” She rolls her own eyes as the words leave her mouth. When she faces Klaus again, he has crossed the gap between them and swaggers closer. “Don’t want to be a high school cautionary tale at the next town meeting,” she says, unable to meet his intense stormy gaze.

“Well,” he begins warmly, “then it’s a good thing that the high school part is nearly over.”

He sounds so genuine and understanding that Caroline is unsure of what to say in response and settles for staring at his kissable lips. Her eyes flicker briefly to his, and she isn’t sure of what her gaze is conveying, of what he can read in the depths of her stare.

Caroline sighs and then smiles at him, decision made. “If we’re going to be nice to each other,” she says, “then I will need that glass of champagne.”

His expression becomes pleased, dark blue eyes twinkling with amusement, and he sidles closer, voice dropping lower and becoming flirtatious. “Is that our thing?” he asks her, ducking his head in a manner that causes Caroline’s mouth to grow dry.

It’s so  _ unfair  _ that someone so attractive, so polished, and so cultured does  _ such  _ vile things: charms Caroline, makes butterflies flutter in her stomach with his stupid accent, makes warmth pool at her core with his stupid smirk.

She’s been undeniably attracted to Klaus since he walked into the gym on Senior Prank Night with his bedroom eyes, and roguish charm, and the Henleys that cling to his stupid torso, even though he forced blood down her boyfriend’s throat and snapped his neck. Still, she hated him immediately for what he’d done to Tyler

Then Tyler bit her, and Klaus swooped in and saved her life. He was gentle; he smiled at her, told her about the beauty of an immortal life, and stroked her hair as she fed from his wrist and began to feel a lust that didn’t only stem from the intimacy of the moment but also from a genuine connection. It was everything uncharacteristic of the monstrous hybrid Klaus that she had heard of and seen so far, the Klaus who relentlessly pursued Elena and killed Aunt Jenna and enslaved the other hybrids.

He seemed to have only shown this kind side to Caroline and continued to do so. He gifted her that gorgeous dress and bracelet for the Mikaelson Ball, flirted and danced and laughed with her, became vulnerable to her, and sketched her. When she bargained with him for one of his hybrids, he could have demanded so much in return, especially pertaining to Elena or Tyler, but he asked for a date with her instead.

Common sense told her shouldn’t laugh, smile, or flirt with him, yet she still keeps doing so. She can’t help that she’s drawn to someone as cruel, as malicious, as Klaus Mikaelson.

“We don’t have a  _ thing _ ,” she tells him at last, voice still light and playful as she shakes her head.

Suave as ever, Klaus nods, smirking with his usual charisma, “Allow me.” 

He moves towards the table of refreshments set on the other side of the Mystic Grill, and Caroline watches his shapely ass retreat with the familiar stirrings of guilt. As usual, he’s flirting with her and conversing with her, trying to find common ground between them, and as usual, Caroline’s taking advantage of his familiarity and betraying his trust and appreciation.

He’s across the Grill, getting them champagne, and she’s here, helping Stefan break into his house to find the sword and plotting his death with Tyler and the rest of the hybrids. Klaus has hurt her and her friends, but Caroline still feels like a terrible person over her actions, and she doesn’t truly understand why.

She pulls out her phone and stares down at it for several moments, thumbing to Stefan’s messages so she can text him back. But she doesn’t begin typing.

Caroline’s vampire ears pick up the sound of rigid footsteps approaching, and she slips her phone back into her clutch just as Klaus reappears by her side.

“Here, love,” he says as he offers her a flute of golden, bubbly champagne.

“Thanks,” she tells him, smiling genuinely. “Why don’t you tell me more about how you snuck a painting into the Louvre? Isn’t it usually the other way around?”

 

**iii.**

Caroline, the doppelganger, and Stefan cower on the ground. They’re hunched over as the vindictive witch continues to chant, casting her magic over them. Caroline’s beautiful features contort in pain, and she grunts and whimpers as the witch and her cohorts begin to chant louder. 

Klaus’s vision flashes red as rage flares up in him at the sight and sounds of his bright and bubbly baby vampire suffering. He shoves his rage and concern deep down and channels it into something much more useful: cruelty and intent. Carefully, he stoops down to the grass and collects a bright-red cap left abandoned by some careless human student. He only hesitates long enough to position the cap correctly in his right hand, angling his body  _ just so _ .

With a flick of his wrist, therefore, the cap flies from his hand at supernatural speed and slashes through the skin, tendons, and bone of the witch’s head. Decapitating her.

Her cohorts are startled enough that their chanting and spell-casting grind to a halt, and Caroline and her friends are able to stumble to their feet while Klaus retrieves another graduation cap from the ground in a matter of seconds.

“There are plenty more of these to go around,” he declares, examining the cap in his hands before glancing up at the wary witches who cast anxious looks amongst each other. “Who’s next? I can do this all day,” he says.

The doppelganger gapes at him. Stefan furrows his brow, a commonality in aspect for him these days, as he steps in front of Elena. Caroline straightens, up however; she meets his gaze, her golden waves tucked under her graduation cap, and smiles gratefully.

It’s a bright and beatific expression that he’s seen often but only occasionally directed towards him. Her smile removes the caution from her eyes and enhances her already-radiant features to such an extent that he cannot prevent himself from returning it, and smiling back.

When the rest of the dreadful witches have been taken care of and Stefan and the doppelganger have hurried away to the useless Damon Salvatore’s side, a vial of Klaus’s blood clutched in their greedy hands, Caroline returns to the ceremony, and Klaus watches the proceedings from a distance.

He’s never mingled with humans at such a redundant occasion as a high school graduation, and he doesn’t intend to climb into the bleachers and sit among the residents of Mystic Falls today, either. Not even for Caroline’s sake.

Once the ceremony is complete and night has fallen, the humans leave in droves. Happy human families with their happy children go on to live completely ordinary lives, but it’s Caroline who remains alone and isolated by the commencement stage, tending to neglected graduation gowns and caps.

As Klaus crosses the football field, approaching her, he notices that she has shed her own graduation gown to reveal her cream-colored floral dress and a single circular pendant hanging around the delicate arch of her neck. She must hear the grass crunch underfoot of his expensive Italian dress shoes with her keen vampire senses, for she glances over her shoulder and patiently waits for him to arrive before her.

“How’d you get here so fast?” she asks quietly, expression neutral and unexpectant.

“I was already on my way,” Klaus admits, and Caroline’s perfectly-shaped eyebrows raise in astonishment. He simply smiles and reaches inside his coat pocket to retrieve a white envelope embossed with the Mystic High School logo and covered in Caroline’s neat, slanting print. “It was … very subtle,” he says, glancing down at it.

Caroline’s eyes fall shut, and she winces slightly, cheeks rosy. Then she directs her gaze back to Klaus and smiles softly, exposing her brilliant white teeth.

“I assume you’re expecting cash?” he asks, lips curving into a grin.

“That,” she replies with her usual amount of pep, “or a mini-fridge.” 

“Well,” Klaus begins slowly, “I had considered offering you a first-class ticket to join me in New Orleans…” And as he says these words, Caroline hesitates and ducks her head to avoid meeting his direct gaze, her eyelashes fluttering as she blinks several times. Undeterred by her nonresponse, he continues quickly, “but I knew what your answer would be.” He pauses, tongue darting out to wet his lips, and considers his next words carefully, the unspoken meaning of his message weighing heavily on Caroline in the silence. “So, I opted for something I knew you would accept.”

Caroline glances up at him, lifting her head and tilting it expectantly as she waits for him to continue speaking. Her full attention is on him, her eyes rapt and her face aglow with exhilaration.

Klaus wishes he could remain in this moment forever, under Caroline’s gaze, with her expression soft, with her so young, timeless, and vivid against the backdrop of the velvety night sky. So, he deliberates, the moments stretching slow like vicious syrup, until he can nearly sense Caroline’s patience fraying as words rise to the tip of her tongue.

“Tyler is now free to return to Mystic Falls,” he tells her and watches her features transform with astonishment and disbelief.

“What?” 

“He’s your first love.” Klaus meets her gaze hesitantly, and she stares back at him, her face contorted in a mix of befuddlement and hope. “I intend to be your last,” he declares and tracks her cerulean eyes as they dart from him to the empty bleachers. “However long it takes.”

Swiftly, he leans forward, ducking his head, and plants a brief kiss of her cheek, relishing the feel of her soft, smooth skin against his own. He hears her breath hitch.

“Congratulations, Caroline.”

_ Come with me _ , he means.  _ We’ll face whatever it is that awaits, together _ .

Caroline laughs softly, elated as if Klaus has given her the greatest gift she’s ever received. He would release Tyler many times and over, just to see her smile, which is as radiant as the sun, again.

Klaus chuckles to himself, knowing that he sounds like a love-sick fool. “Let’s get out of here,” he tells Caroline as they turn together to walk back off the football field, “before twelve angry hybrids decide to pick a fight.”

“Klaus,” she says, hesitating by his side. “I think I’ll take that ticket.”

“I would love to show you New Orleans, love.”  _ I would love to be by your side for the rest of eternity,  _ he wants to add but doesn’t.

 

**iv.**

Panic flooding her veins, Caroline dashes through the woods at the brink of her vampire speed. Trees and rocks blur into a hazy background around her, and she narrowly avoids crashing into something several times. Every few hundred feet, she halts and scours the area for any sign of freshly dug dirt or footprints, screaming for Matt, but to no avail. There’s no indication of where Katherine’s bitch of a daughter, Nadia, has buried their human friend.

Caroline speeds ahead and yells again, “Matt! Matt, we’re coming for you!”

In the quiet of the woods, which is punctuated only by faint birdsong, there is a harsh snap of twigs, and Caroline’s head snaps in the direction of the new arrival.

“Hello, Caroline,” Klaus says coyly, his accent caressing her name in a delicate way that she hasn’t heard in months.

He’s standing there causally in his usual ensemble of a dark jacket, Henley, and jeans with a beaded necklace around his neck, mirth glittering in his stormy eyes. The world swoops out from underneath her feet as she takes him in, so much so that she’s hit by a kind of disorienting dizziness she hasn’t experienced since she was human.

“Klaus…” she gasps before sense comes crashing back to her. “Sorry. Matt’s buried alive. No time to chat.” With that, Caroline speeds away, heading in the opposite direction.

Unseen to her, Klaus smirks to himself before pursuing. Within seconds, he’s able to catch up to her, “Are you not the least bit curious as to why I’m here?” he says

Caroline abruptly halts and turns to face him. “I literally just  _ wooshed  _ at the sight of your face, so no!”

“Damon informed me that Katerina Petrova took a tragic turn.”

Disappointment strikes her hard, and for a brief moment, her face falls, but she manages to collect herself because  _ what else did she expect from Klaus Mikaelson? _

“So, you’re here to gloat over her corpse-to-be? Delight in the closure of five hundred years of revenge?” she drawls, affecting a tone of nonchalance that she doesn’t truly feel. “Great! I’m even less interested.” She flees again, gaining speed and distance again away from Klaus, but something he calls after her stops her in her tracks.

“Well, perhaps you’d be more interested in talking about Tyler,” he says, and she stumbles.

She whirls around, eyes blazing, wordless. “Is he…  _ Did you _ ?” she stutters.

“Nah,” he says. “I sent him off with little more than a bruised ego. He really does hate me, poor lad. Revenge…it eats at him.” Klaus tilts his head with a knowing expression, lips curving into his usual smirk. “I hear you two broke up.”

Filled with fury, Caroline purses her lips. “Because I made him choose: me, or his stupid revenge fantasy.” She pauses briefly. “He chose wrong. I suggest you learn from his mistake and let Katherine die in peace.” She levels him with a disapproving gaze. “Dying sucks enough as it is…no need to rub anyone’s nose in it.”

Caroline moves away again, and he doesn’t follow this time. After what feels like hours of searching, she grows frustrated, returning to a patch of trees that she’s already passed through once or twice before. 

“Matt! Matt!” she screams, tucking her hair behind her ears as she listens intently for even the faintest scream or cry for help.

With a rush of speed, Klaus materializes almost out of nowhere to her right. “Would you give me the same choice?” he questions, his tone almost demanding.

“What?” 

She truly didn’t expect him again, and her irritation is only kept at bay by the astonishment. His words are hurried and hungry. 

“Were I to abandon my revenge against Katerina, would you give me the same choice as Tyler?”

Caroline stares at him, mind whirring, “I don’t know what you mean,” she lies, backing away slightly as she shakes her head.

“Yes, you do,” he insists, taking steps forward towards her as he smiles lightly.

She stiffens and throws her hands in the air. “You can’t do this to me! You can’t just show up when my friend is missing and in danger.”

His expression remains amused, and Caroline wants to scream. 

“You know,” he smirks, “while you’ve been vamping off in all the wrong directions, I heard Matt’s distant and desperate screams.”

Her frustration quickly gives way to alarm, and she glances around her as if Matt will suddenly appear. She takes a step towards Klaus. “Where?”

Klaus has the nerve to chuckle. 

“Don’t worry, love, I’ve got it covered. Trust me.” He lifts his head. “He’ll be quite happy with his rescuer.”

Despite every element in her life that would tell her otherwise, Caroline has never had a very hard time trusting Klaus. It’s almost like it’s a natural instinct ingrained in her, so she relaxes slightly, allowing her shoulders to slump and relief to flood her. If Klaus says that Matt is safe, then Matt is definitely safe.

“Thank you,” she smiles weakly.

“It was my pleasure,” he responds with a wink, the two of them walking idly through the woods. “So, the quarterback has been saved. What now?”

“Don’t you have a dying girl you need to go punish for her sins?” she shoots back.

“I do,” Klaus confesses, “but I won’t...for you.”

Although there’s a spark of warmth in the pit of her stomach at Klaus’s words, Caroline still remains skeptical, “So, you came all the way to Mystic Falls to back off when I tell you?” she asks, raising an eyebrow.

“No,” he tells her, sneaking her a glance. “I came all the way to Mystic Falls to gloat over a corpse-to-be, as you so poetically put it, but I will leave – minus the gloating – in return for one, small thing.” His voice becomes a hushed whisper.

“And what is that?” 

“I want your confession.”

“My confession?” Caroline shakes her head in bewilderment. “I didn’t do anything. Confession about what?”

“Me,” he replies. “As soon as we’re done here, I’m going to walk away,” he pauses, “and I’m never coming back. You’ll never have to look me in the eye and cover our connection with hostility or revulsion. And you’ll never have to loathe the darkest parts of yourself that care for me, in spite of all I’ve done. I will be gone, and you will be free. I just want you to be honest with me.”

Caroline’s jaw drops, and her eyes widen. She bites her lip, unsure of what to say until she musters the right words after a huff. “Look...I’m in college. I’m building a life for myself. I have plans and a future and things that I want, and none of those things involve you.”

His face falls slightly. “I see,”

“No,” Caroline says,“you don’t. Yes, I do cover our connection with hostility, Because, yes, I hate myself for the truth. But I don’t want you to walk away. I want you to stay.”

“Stay?” Klaus repeats, and Caroline thinks she hears the slightest bit of wistfulness in his tone. “I think - I think I can do that.”

 

**v.**

Casting a glance out the window at Alaric playing with the girls, Caroline smiles, reaching for the letters on the side table. The chatter of the students behind her fills her senses, and she spaces out for a brief moment, accidentally knocking the letters to the floor. For a former cheerleader and long-turned vampire, Caroline can be quite distracted and clumsy at times.

She drops to her knees and shuffles for the envelopes, trying to pick some up off the floor but failing to grasp them against the slippery, cold marble.

“Oops,” she says to herself as the letters keep slipping further away. “What good is being a vampire if I can’t even pick letters off the ground?” She rolls her eyes, glad that no one has noticed her rather embarrassing failure.

Warmth settles against her hand, and Caroline swears she feels skin brush against her own as the envelopes push into her palm by an unseen force. The soft scent of jasmine wafts into the air, a familiar aroma from a perfume that Caroline smelt for eighteen years growing up in the Forbes household. She glances up, and the air before her ripples like a hazy mirage.

For a split-second, she sees her mom.

Not the Liz Forbes that Caroline saw on her deathbed, sickly pale and weak and thin, but also not the Liz Forbes Caroline remembers from her childhood, before her dad left, smiling brightly but secretly miserable. She sees Liz Forbes from her happiest memories in her life.

Kneeling besides her in a grey blouse and black slacks, a single chain around her neck, her blonde hair – the same golden shade as Caroline’s – cropped short, Liz Forbes beams proudly at her daughter before the air ripples again.

Caroline blinks, and her mom is gone.

A warm happiness lights up her heart, and she slowly gathers the letters and rises, peering back out the window once more at Lizzie and Josie, the lights of her life. 

She sorts through the envelopes. They are mainly applications to the boarding school and the occasional bill, but one envelope in specific catches her eye. It’s cream-colored and folded from thick parchment paper, unaddressed to anyone and blemish-free. The only identifying feature is a regal, blood-red wax seal where the envelope is creased together.

Still, she has a good feeling about this.

There have only been a few letters like this Caroline Forbes has received in her immortal life, and they have always been a sketch or a vulnerable note from one particular immortal. With steady hands, therefore, she drops the rest of the envelopes onto the desk and takes a seat beside it, snapping the wax seal off and opening the parchment up.

Inside, a single sheet of paper is wrapped around a smaller slip, and she flashes back several years ago to when a certain silver-tongued hybrid left her a gorgeous sketch with the words  _ Thank you for your honesty. _

She smiles softly and reaches to unfold the letter, but the smaller paper is revealed to be a check filled out in Klaus’s sloping cursive, addressed to her for…

“Three million dollars?” Caroline gasps, chuckling. “Trust Klaus Mikaelson not to do anything in small amounts.”

She knew Klaus Mikaelson was rich – he lives in a freaking mansion for goodness sakes; he gifted her a gorgeous gown and a diamond bracelet – yet it’s still surprising every time she’s reminded of his money worth. Sometimes, she wonders how of much of it was legally accumulated. Even with the Salvatores, their money was mostly inherited but also came from businesses that the brothers had invested in.

Caroline laughs again, setting the check aside on the table, and straightens out the letter, smoothing down the creases, to study Klaus’s messy handwriting.

_ Dearest Caroline, _

_ I had often imagined the paths your life might take, but your chosen future is more noble than I have ever fathomed. Please accept this contribution to your virtuous cause. I do look forward to thanking you in person. _

_ Someday… _

_ However long it takes. _

_ Yours, Klaus _

_ However long it takes _ , Caroline mouths.

Klaus said those words to her over a decade ago at her high school graduation as they walked across the football field. Many nights, she hears the words echo through her head, the syllables softened by his elegant accent. It’s been the one steady promise she’s believed in throughout the last decade, unwavering while boyfriends floated in and out of her life. Even when Stefan proposed to her, her first thought was of Klaus.

_ However long it takes _ , she repeats again and reaches for her phone, dialing the number she still remembers by heart.

“Hello, sweetheart,” Klaus says.

“Klaus,” Caroline replies, “You still want to thank me in person?”

 

**\+ i.**

Klaus stares forlornly at the painting, one that reminds Caroline of a certain snowflake from so long ago, and she figures that he’s just confronting the repercussions of his decision to die, dwelling on what his life has meant.

She’s dealt with Stefan doing that; she’s not going to allow her last love, her true love, to do the same.

“Okay, we need a drink,” she announces, echoing an offer he once made her in the Mystic Grill in front of Kol when she latches onto Klaus’s wrist and pulls him into the Mardi Gras crowd of partygoers. Despite all his supernatural hybrid strength, he doesn’t resist. “Maybe six.”

Drinking won’t solve all her problems, but right now, it looks like her best solution, even if it’s only temporary.

After they stumble down several streets as they try to find a bar that isn’t shut down or crammed with drunken tourists, Klaus solves their problem by guiding her down a side street. 

“I know a place, love,” he tells her with every ounce of his usual charisma, not even the slightest bit rattled for an undead immortal with a ticking body clock. “It’s best that we head there instead of shoving through rambunctious humans.”

He leads her to a familiar bar called  _ Rousseau’s _ . While she’s only seen it empty, now it’s filled with people who seem to be supernatural, and who are seated at various tables at or near the bar counter. There’s even a piano player positioned in the center of the establishment who draws the occasional applause from the bar’s patrons as he finishes songs.

Klaus and Caroline take a seat at the bar and order a bourbon each, waiting quietly as their drinks are made. Once the bartender slides them their drinks, no words are said; they simply sip their liquor.

At one point, Caroline slides her elbow onto the wooden counter and rests her head on her arm, peering at Klaus who rolls his glass between his hands and examines it intently. The silence is heavy and palpable, over a decade worth of shared moments hanging between them, begging to be discussed. 

But she doesn’t know what to say; doesn’t know where to begin. 

This isn’t how it was supposed to happen, it isn’t how they were meant to reunite in the city he promised to show her. She had imagined him nursing a drink in a bar like this where she would walk in and make a quip about Klaus being her last love. Or maybe it would happen in Rome. 

Or Paris. 

Or Tokyo.

She had imagined every scenario but this: Klaus dying. This meeting in New Orleans being their final, their last shared moment, their farewell.

“Would you even be here if I had longer to live?” he asks at last.

For a brief moment, his façade as Klaus Mikaelson the Original hybrid – Klaus the Mad - fades away, and Caroline catches a glimpse of the tired man beneath: weary from the mania that comes from looking over your shoulder, waiting for enemies; exhausted from living longer than nature had meant or intended. She also sees the young, hopeful boy who cowered away from Mikael, the idealistic and ever-feeling artist, the tortured lost soul. She sees every face of Klaus Mikaelson that she has ever met, ever connected with, ever fell for, in a moment.

But, even with all guises and false fronts stripped away, the man before her is still Klaus Mikaelson, and he glances up at her expectantly.

She finds her words, finds the right response waiting on the tip of her tongue, because it’s what he’ll want to hear. It’s the truth.

“Maybe I’d let you chase me around a few more centuries.” She raises her glass to her lips and takes a sip. “That was always the fun part anyway.” 

She smiles, and Klaus mirrors her expression. They lapse back into a brief silence after that, and Caroline muses on everything she wants to tell Klaus.

There’s so much to say, but so little time.

They’ve changed so much from the first time they met - he the cruel immortal after Elena; she, the baby vampire dating Tyler. They both have children. She was married and widowed on the same day.

Caroline stares at him intensely for a few seconds before telling him, “Say goodbye to your daughter, Klaus. Give her real closure.”

“Closure is a myth,” he sighs before draining his glass of bourbon.

“Look, what you’re doing is noble, Klaus,” she says, attempting her hardest to keep her regret and grief from filtering into her tone, though from the look that Klaus sends her, she’s not entirely successful. “But, if you don’t say goodbye, if - if you leave Hope with questions and pain and anger, you’ll haunt her…And I don’t think that’s your endgame.”

The words she says, the advice she gives him, all stems from that broken little place in her heart that no love, no man or boyfriend, no sex, no alcohol, not even her own mother could fix. She speaks as the little girl whose own dad left her, who returned only to hate her on principle for what she unintentionally became, who tried to torture her vampirism out of her, who was almost accepted by her dad on his deathbed but who she could never forgive.

_ That’s what I would have wanted _ , her mind whispers.

Klaus shakes his head and sighs again, tears glinting at the corner of his eyes.

The Klaus Mikaelson Caroline knew would not have been brought to tears so easily, but then again, he’d changed. They’ve both changed.

Leaning forward, Klaus presses his lips together tightly, and the tears begin leaking slowly down his face. “I don’t know how to say goodbye.”

And isn’t that incredibly ironic? One of the oldest living vampires, with more bodies on his kill list than the years that Caroline has been alive, doesn’t know to say goodbye. He’s seen countless of friends, enemies, allies, lovers succumb to the quiet sleep of death, but yet he has never learned.

All the emotions she’s shoved deep-down come flooding back. The grief, the regret, the anger, the pity, the love--every single thing she’d ever felt when she’d first heard about Klaus dying and she’d thought,  _ no, no, no, this can’t happen to me again _ .

_ You were supposed to be my last love _ , she wants to scream at him.

Her eyes flutter shut before opening again. Her mind falls silent.

“Try this,” she tells him softly, tears prickling at the corners of her own eyes. “One of you stands, walks to the door but doesn’t turn back. Even if their heart aches for just--” her voice breaks as she stumbles over the words, “for just one more look, one more moment, you’ll know that the not-looking just means  _ I’ll never forget you _ .”

Klaus smiles weakly but gratefully.

Caroline places her hand on the back of his chair and leans forward slightly. She moves in and does what her heart has been screaming at her to do since she first laid eyes on Klaus on the balcony. She kisses him gently, softly, tenderly, and pours all of her unspoken words, her unspoken emotions, into the embrace and makes sure he understands.

It’s perfect.

When they finally separate, their lips parting, a fundamental piece of Caroline shatters. She knows right then that it’ll never heal. It will always be empty -  missing - hollow - for the rest of her immortal life. There will never be another person who will fill the place of Klaus Mikaelson, or the hole that he will leave behind.

He glances down, parting his lips briefly to speak, but remains wordless.

She takes that as her cue, rising to her feet despite everything in her body screaming at her to  _ stay _ , her knees wobbling from the effort it takes to stand, her mind and heart fighting against the heavy weight of sorrow and love that ties her back to Klaus.

Caroline rises and walks to the exit of the bar, pausing at the door. She can feel Klaus’s eyes on her, knows that he’s smiling, and smiles in return knowing that she’s brought him peace, closure, no matter how temporary it may be. 

She hesitates for a second longer, then walks out of the bar, the hole in her heart embalmed with his name.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on tumblr [here](http://princess-of-the-worlds.tumblr.com/) to let me know how much you liked this fic or request a prompt. Comments and kudos would be nice too!


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